To create a Container Service for Kubernetes (ACK) managed cluster, you only need to create nodes. You do not need to maintain control planes. The control planes are created and managed by ACK. This reduces O&M costs and allows you to focus on application development. This topic describes how to create an ACK managed cluster in the ACK console.
Table of contents
Prerequisites
Limits
Item | Limit | Links for increasing quota limits/references | |
Networks | ACK clusters support only VPCs. | ||
Cloud resources | ECS | The pay-as-you-go and subscription billing methods are supported. After an ECS instance is created, you can change its billing method from pay-as-you-go to subscription in the ECS console. | Change the billing method of an ECS instance from pay-as-you-go to subscription |
VPC route entries | By default, you can add at most 200 route entries to the VPC of an ACK cluster that runs Flannel. VPCs of ACK clusters that run Terway do not have this limit. If you want to add more route entries to the VPC of your ACK cluster, request a quota increase for the VPC. | ||
Security groups | By default, you can create at most 100 security groups with each account. | ||
SLB instances | By default, you can create at most 60 pay-as-you-go SLB instances with each account. | ||
EIP | By default, you can create at most 20 EIPs with each account. |
Billing
For more information about the billing rules of ACK clusters, see Billing.
Step 1: Log on to the ACK console
Log on to the ACK console. In the left-side navigation pane, click Clusters.
In the upper-right corner of the Clusters page, click Create Kubernetes Cluster.
Step 2: Configure a cluster
On the Managed Kubernetes page, configure the basic settings and advanced settings of the cluster.
Basic settings
Parameter | Description |
All Resources | Move the pointer over All Resources at the top of the page and select the resource group that you want to use. After you select a resource group, virtual private clouds (VPCs) and vSwitches that belong to the resource group are displayed. When you create a cluster, only the VPCs and vSwitches that belong to the selected resource group are displayed in the console. ![]() |
Cluster Name | Enter a name for the cluster. Note The name must be 1 to 63 characters in length, and can contain digits, letters, hyphens (-), and underscores (_). The name cannot start with an underscore (_). |
Cluster Type | Select a cluster type. You can select Professional or Standard edition. We recommend that you use Container Service for Kubernetes (ACK) Pro clusters in the production environment and test environment. ACK standard clusters can meet the learning and testing needs of individual users. |
Region | Select a region to deploy the cluster. |
Billing Method | Two billing methods are supported: Pay-As-You-Go and Subscription. If you select the subscription billing method, you must set the following parameters: Note If you set Billing Method to Subscription, only Elastic Compute Service (ECS) instances and Server Load Balancer (SLB) instances are billed on a subscription basis. Other cloud resources are billed on a pay-as-you-go basis. For more information about the billing rules of Alibaba Cloud resources, see Billing of cloud services.
|
Kubernetes Version | The Kubernetes versions supported by ACK are displayed. |
IPv6 Dual-stack | If you enable IPv4/IPv6 dual-stack, a dual-stack cluster is created. This feature is in public preview. To use this feature, submit an application in Quota Center. Important
|
VPC | Select a VPC to deploy the cluster. Standard VPCs and shared VPCs are supported.
Note ACK clusters support only VPCs. You can select a VPC from the drop-down list. If no VPC is available, click Create VPC to create one. For more information, see Create and manage a VPC. |
Network Plug-in | Select a network plug-in. Flannel and Terway are supported. For more information, see Terway and Flannel.
|
vSwitch | Select vSwitches. You can select up to three vSwitches that are deployed in different zones. If no vSwitch is available, click Create vSwitch to create one. For more information, see Create and manage a vSwitch. |
Pod vSwitch | If you select Terway as the network plug-in, you must select vSwitches to allocate IP addresses to pods. For each vSwitch that allocates IP addresses to worker nodes, you must select a vSwitch in the same zone to allocate IP addresses to pods. |
Pod CIDR Block | If you select Flannel, you must set Pod CIDR Block. The pod CIDR block must not overlap with the CIDR block of the VPC, the CIDR blocks of the ACK clusters in the VPC, or the Service CIDR block. The pod CIDR block cannot be modified after it is specified. For more information about how to plan CIDR blocks for an ACK cluster, see Plan CIDR blocks for an ACK cluster. |
Number of Pods per Node | If you set Network Plug-in to Flannel, you must set Number of Pods per Node. |
Service CIDR | Set Service CIDR. The Service CIDR block must not overlap with the CIDR block of the VPC, the CIDR blocks of the ACK clusters in the VPC, or the pod CIDR block. The Service CIDR block cannot be modified after it is specified. For more information about how to plan CIDR blocks for an ACK cluster, see Plan CIDR blocks for an ACK cluster. |
IPv6 Service CIDR | If you enable IPv4/IPv6 dual stack, you must specify an IPv6 CIDR block for Services. When you set this parameter, take note of the following items:
|
Configure SNAT | By default, the check box is selected. If the VPC that you select for the cluster cannot access the Internet, you can select Configure SNAT for VPC. This way, ACK will create a NAT gateway and configure SNAT rules to enable Internet access for the VPC. |
Access to API Server | By default, an internal-facing SLB instance is created for the Kubernetes API server of the cluster. You can modify the specification of the SLB instance. For more information, see Specifications. Important If you delete the SLB instance, you cannot access the API server of the cluster. Select or clear Expose API Server with EIP. The ACK API server provides multiple HTTP-based RESTful APIs, which can be used to create, delete, modify, query, and monitor resources, such as pods and Services.
|
Security group | You can select Create Basic Security Group, Create Advanced Security Group, or Select Existing Security Group. For more information about security groups, see Overview. Note
|
Deletion Protection | Specify whether to enable deletion protection for the cluster. Deletion protection can prevent clusters from being accidentally released by using the console or API. |
Resource group | The resource group that owns the cluster to be created. Each resource can belong only to one resource group. You can regard a resource group as a project, an application, or an organization based on your business scenarios. For more information, see Resource groups. |
Advanced settings
Click Show Advanced Options to configure advanced settings.
Step 3: Configure the node pool
Click Next:Node Pool Configurations to configure the basic settings and advanced settings of the node pool.
Basic settings
Parameter | Description |
Node Pool Name | Specify a node pool name. |
Managed Node Pool | Specify whether to enable the managed node pool feature. Managed node pools provided by ACK support auto repair and auto CVE patching. These capabilities reduce your O&M workload and improve node security. For more information, see Overview of managed node pools. |
Maintenance Window | Note The Maintenance Window parameter is available only for managed node pools. Click Set. In the Maintenance Window dialog box, set the Cycle, Started At, and Duration parameters. Click OK. |
Container Runtime | Specify the container runtime based on the Kubernetes version. The following list describes the Kubernetes versions supported by different container runtimes:
|
Instance Type | You can select multiple instance types. You can filter instance types by vCPU, memory, architecture, or category. Note The instance types that you select are displayed in the Selected Types section. If the node pool fails to be scaled out because the instance types are unavailable or the instances are out of stock, you can specify more instance types for the node pool. The ACK console automatically evaluates the scalability of the node pool. You can view the scalability level when you create the node pool or after you create the node pool.
Note ARM-based ECS instances support only images for ARM. For more information about ARM-based node pools, see Configure an ARM-based node pool. |
Selected Types | The selected instance types are displayed. |
Quantity | Specify the number of worker nodes (ECS instances) to be created. Note We recommend that you configure at least two worker nodes. After the cluster is created, you can adjust the number of worker nodes to meet your business requirements. If the cluster has only one worker node or contains low-specification worker nodes, cluster components may not run as expected. |
System Disk | Enhanced SSDs, standard SSDs, and ultra disks are supported. The types of system disks that you can select depend on the instance types that you select. For more information about the disk types supported by different instance types, see Overview of instance families. Disk types that are not displayed in the drop-down list are not supported by the instance types that you select. Note
|
Mount Data Disk | Enhanced SSDs (ESSDs), standard SSDs, and ultra disks are supported. The disk types that you can select depend on the instance types that you select. For more information about the disk types supported by different instance types, see Overview of instance families. Disk types that are not displayed in the drop-down list are not supported by the instance types that you select. Note
|
Operating System | ACK supports images for the following operating systems:
Note
|
Security Reinforcement |
Note You cannot change the settings of the Security Reinforcement parameter after the cluster is created. |
Logon Type | Valid values: Key Pair, Password, and Later. Note If you select Reinforcement based on classified protection for the Security Reinforcement parameter, only the Key Pair option is supported.
|
Public IP | Specify whether to allocate an IPv4 address to each node. If you clear the check box, no public IP address is allocated. If you select the check box, you must also set the Bandwidth Billing Method and Peak Bandwidth parameters. Note This parameter takes effect only on newly added nodes and does not take effect on existing nodes. If you want to enable an existing node to access the Internet, you must create an elastic IP address (EIP) and associate the EIP with the node. For more information, see Associate an EIP with an ECS instance. |
CloudMonitor Agent | Specify whether to install the CloudMonitor agent. After you install the CloudMonitor agent on ECS nodes, you can view the monitoring information about the nodes in the CloudMonitor console. Note This parameter takes effect only on newly added nodes and does not take effect on existing nodes. If you want to install the CloudMonitor agent on an existing ECS node, go to the CloudMonitor console. |
Advanced settings
Click Show Advanced Options to configure advanced settings.
Step 4: Configure cluster components
Click Next:Component Configurations to configure the basic settings and advanced settings of cluster components.
Basic settings
Parameter | Description |
Ingress | Specify whether to install an Ingress controller. By default, Nginx Ingress is selected. Valid values:
|
Service Discovery | Specify whether to install NodeLocal DNSCache. By default, NodeLocal DNSCache is installed. NodeLocal DNSCache runs a Domain Name System (DNS) caching agent to improve the performance and stability of DNS resolution. For more information about NodeLocal DNSCache, see Configure NodeLocal DNSCache. |
Volume Plug-in | By default, CSI is installed as the volume plug-in. Dynamically Provision Volumes by Using Default NAS File Systems and CNFS, Enable NAS Recycle Bin, and Support Fast Data Restore is selected by default . ACK clusters can be automatically bound to Alibaba Cloud disks, Apsara File Storage NAS (NAS) file systems, and Object Storage Service (OSS) buckets that are mounted to pods. For more information, see Storage management - CSI. |
Monitoring Agents | Enable Prometheus Monitoring is selected by default to monitor ACK clusters and generate alerts. |
Alerts | Use Default Alert Rule Template is selected by default to enable alert rules. After you select this check box, you can specify contacts and contact groups. The default is Default Contact Group. For more information, see Alert management. |
Log Service | Specify whether to enable Log Service. You can select an existing Log Service project or create one. By default, Enable Log Service is selected. When you create an application, you can enable Log Service with a few steps. For more information, see Collect log data from containers by using Log Service. By default, Create Ingress Dashboard is selected. You can specify whether to create Ingress dashboards in the Log Service console. For more information, see Analyze and monitor the access log of nginx-ingress-controller. By default, Install node-problem-detector and Create Event Center is selected. You can specify whether to enable the Kubernetes event center in the Log Service console. For more information, see Create and use an event center. |
Log Collection for Control Plane Components | By default, Enable is selected to collect the logs of the control plane components in ACK managed clusters to your projects in Log Service. For more information, see Collect the logs of control plane components in ACK Pro clusters. |
Workflow Engine | Specify whether to enable Alibaba Cloud Genomics Service (AGS). Note To use this feature, submit a ticket to apply to be added to a whitelist.
|
Cluster Inspection | Specify whether to enable the cluster inspection feature for intelligent O&M. You can enable this feature to periodically check the resource quotas, resource usage, and component versions of a cluster and identify potential risks in the cluster. For more information, see Work with the cluster inspection feature. |
Advanced settings
Click Show Advanced Options to select the components that you want to install.
Step 5: Confirm the cluster configurations
Click Next:Confirm Order, confirm the configurations, read and select the terms of service, and then click Create Cluster.
After the cluster is created, you can find the cluster on the Clusters page in the ACK console.
It requires about 10 minutes to create an ACK cluster that contains multiple nodes.
What to do next
View the basic information about the cluster
On the Clusters page, find the created cluster and click Details in the Actions column. On the cluster details page, click the Basic Information tab to view the basic information about the cluster and click the Connection Information tab to view information about how to connect to the cluster. The following information is displayed:
API Server Public Endpoint: the IP address and port that the API server of the cluster uses to provide services over the Internet. It allows you to manage the cluster by using kubectl or other tools on your client.
Only ACK managed clusters support the Associate EIP and Disassociate EIP features.
Associate EIP: You can select an existing EIP or create an EIP.
The API server restarts after you associate an EIP with the API server. We recommend that you do not perform operations on the cluster during the restart process.
Disassociate EIP: After you disassociate the EIP, you can no longer access the API server over the Internet.
The API server restarts after you disassociate the EIP from the API server. We recommend that you do not perform operations on the cluster during the restart process.
API Server Internal Endpoint: the IP address and port that the API server uses to provide services within the cluster. The IP address belongs to the Server Load Balancer (SLB) instance that is associated with the cluster.
View cluster logs
You can choose
in the Actions column to go to the Log Center page and view the logs of the cluster.View the information of nodes in the cluster
You can obtain the kubeconfig file of the cluster and use kubectl to connect to the cluster, and run the
kubectl get node
command to view the node information of the cluster.